Giriraj Swami read and spoke from Sri Caitanya-caritamrta, Madhaya-lila 19.151 and Adi-lila 8.24, during the initiations of Bhakta Akash and Bhaktin Komeshnee, in which he gave them the spiritual names Akrura dasa and Kamala-sundari dasi, respectively.
“Anartha-nivrtti is a very critical stage in which unwanted desires and behaviors are eradicated. Devotees can get stuck and spend a long, long time without passing through this stage—because to pass through it requires work. In Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu’s analogy about the devotional creeper, he says that after receiving the seed of devotion one should become a gardener and plant the seed and water it by chanting and hearing. And he states that one should be careful of weeds, or unwanted creepers, that grow up alongside the devotional creeper. These weeds can very closely resemble the devotional creeper; they can appear to be of the same size and the same variety as the devotional creeper, but they are actually weeds, and if one is not careful, the water from the chanting and hearing can be sucked up by these weeds. So, that is another way of looking at why someone can remain stuck for a long time—because the person is not able to distinguish between the real creeper and the weeds. The weeds, in broad terms, are material desires. So, one may be chanting and engaging in so many devotional activities, but within oneself one may want some material position or even harbor some covert desire to merge and become one with God, or Brahman. So, to pass through anartha-nivrtti requires sincerity and effort.”
